The Sorted alternative with free bookkeeping

It depends on what you need: the market includes Accountable, sevDesk, lexoffice, and Norman, among others. Sorted is a lean, guided tax app for solo self-employed people; if you want more than just tax filing, Norman is the most obvious pick: invoicing and full bookkeeping are free for good with no receipt cap, the AI captures receipts and matches bank activity automatically, and you work on desktop just as well as on mobile. You only pay when you file tax returns.

Norman is free for invoicing and bookkeeping; only the tax return is paid: the Klein plan starts at €9/month and the Pro plan with VAT returns at €21/month (billed yearly). Sorted has a free Starter plan (invoicing, bank connection, expenses); tax filing starts at the Kleinunternehmer plan for €98/year, and the full feature set with VAT returns at the Pro plan for €20/month (billed quarterly, about €240/year). For pure Kleinunternehmer tax filing, Sorted is cheap, but Norman adds full bookkeeping, AI receipts, and e-invoices on top for free. Sorted prices as shown on getsorted.de, as of June 2026.

Yes: Norman. Invoicing, quotes, and full bookkeeping (AI receipt capture, bank matching, and EÜR) are free for good with no pricing tier; there is no time limit and no receipt cap. Sorted also has a free Starter plan with invoicing and a bank connection, but as soon as you submit a tax filing to the tax office, you need a paid plan. The only paid part in Norman is the finished tax return, from the Klein plan (from €9/month).

Sorted relies on guided forms rather than automation: you enter income and expenses, and the tool generates EÜR, VAT returns, and income tax from them and files via ELSTER. Categorization and receipt assignment stay largely manual. Norman, by contrast, is built around AI from the ground up: the AI reads receipts, suggests the booking and tax rate, matches bank activity automatically, and keeps EÜR and VAT returns continuously up to date. If minimal manual bookkeeping matters to you, that's the core difference.

Yes. Norman creates and receives structured e-invoices in the ZUGFeRD and XRechnung formats, in every plan and at no extra cost, in line with the B2B e-invoicing mandate. With Sorted, structured e-invoices are not part of the feature set as things stand; invoicing is geared toward classic PDF invoices. If e-invoices are or become standard for you, you get them in Norman without extra software.

Master data such as customers and open invoices can be exported and imported into Norman; receipts you upload or forward by email: the AI reads them. The cleanest switch is at a quarter or year boundary: you start from a clear cut-off date instead of copying the running history mid-period. Because Norman also covers full bookkeeping for free, you can run both in parallel and move over at your own pace.

It depends on your setup. Sorted plays to its strengths if you only want to file your tax return in a guided way as a solo self-employed person and prefer a lean, browser-based flow, optionally with tax-advisor support. Norman is the better choice if you want free invoicing and full bookkeeping without a subscription, use AI receipt capture with no receipt cap, need e-invoices, or want to stay on board as a UG or GmbH. On DATEV, Norman is clearly ahead: it offers a full DATEV integration including booking data and a REST API that Sorted doesn't have. And because Norman is actively developed and built AI-first, new tax logic and formats are added continuously.

Norman is available in German, English, and more: you can switch the interface, which is especially helpful for international founders in Germany. Sorted is also available in German and English, which makes it a good fit for expats. If you want to work multilingually and have full bookkeeping in an actively maintained tool at the same time, Norman is more flexible.